7 minutes ago, JoeH said:

Clubs circling around to take Keinan Davis on a loan. He would add unreal value to us if we could do it. Probably end up at Boro

Absolutely bullied us at Ewood. As good as Van Hecke was, he did have a small number of games where he looked like fish out of water and one of those was when he came up against Davis. 

8 minutes ago, BigBar said:

Buckley not even in the top 5 performers last year yet some on here are being force fed the narrative we can't see what others with superior football intelligence can. Can you tell me who else I should rate that isn't putting in consistent performances so we can all catch up?

I think you could easily argue that he was to be fair. Certainly as far as the attack and midfield go, there was only Brereton who I'd have in front of him. I'd have him in the top five alongside Brereton and the back three. 

1 minute ago, Tyrone Shoelaces said:

They used to excuse Scholes when he committed a bad foul. “ He doesn’t know how to tackle “. Bollocks - he knew exactly what he was doing. 

Nasty player because he had to be. Despite being the best of the lot, he didn't even get in that Man United youth team XI because players used to just run over him. You can see their coaches telling him endlessly that he needs to find a way to not be bullied, because that would be the only thing that would stop him being a player.

It's a different game now, but I wonder if Buckley's poor discipline can be attributed to a similar thing. I suppose a lot of Buckley's cards have come more through petulance rather than bad fouls, but there have been a few of those too.

3 minutes ago, Sparks Rover said:

I'd love to be arsed to go back 10 months on here to see what everyone was saying about JR.....From what I remember he was the dogs bollocks and now he a load of shit....🙈

Yeah - whereas in reality neither is really true. 

He definitely flattered to deceive. If Buckley drifts in and out of games, Rothwell was on a different level. For a player who got himself into so many good attacking positions, you'd expect him to score and create more than he did. 

BUT the way that he could travel with the ball from deep did play a huge part in our good early season form. Similarly to Buckley too, just because he isn't involved in the final ball doesn't mean that he hasn't played a vital role earlier in creating the chance. 

I think he's a good level Championship player, no point pretending that he's no good just because he binned us off. 

Just now, 47er said:

Scholes in a different class defensively. Buckley's strength is the ability to pick out "that pass".

 

Seeing Buckley's pointless yellow card last weekend screamed Paul Scholes to me!

I think you're right that Scholes got stuck in more, but on the ball and how they play, there are some real crossovers I think.

(Which isn't to say that Buckley's in his class - obviously. Although at the same time the world class version of Scholes which everyone remembers only really developed in his mid-20s).

39 minutes ago, BigBar said:

My eyes and ability to not just tell myself something I want to be true. Not enough assists, not enough goals, went missing so often, missed multiple one on ones, dilly dallied in possession countless times. You disagree?

I'm a huge Buckley fan, but I think saying he should score/assist more is a fair criticism. He was playing further up the pitch last year than Rothwell, so he should be contributing decent numbers.

That said, I think the dilly dallying on the ball is something that he doesn't really do anymore. He keeps possession excellently and hardly ever gives it away unless it's when he's playing a through ball.

I see Buckley as a bit of a poundshop Paul Scholes. His goals/assists actually aren't that fantastic, but will play a crucial role earlier on in the move and is vital at making the team tick.

31 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

Great post. If a young player as an individual is deemed to be good enough then he will break through either way, every summer with this one particularly bad, we have this thing where people say we don't need to replace x number of senior departees because our young players will all simultaneously step up.

That R number is a load of nonsense. If you start measuring targets like that, there becomes a very real chance of that objective conflicting with that of winning football matches.

Probably, but not necessarily at Rovers!

James Beattie had an amazing career, for all the good it did us. 

1 minute ago, roversfan99 said:

The thing is, the benchmark is always to revert to being "as good" as last season. 

I personally don't think that we were strong enough in central midfield last season, and got lucky with injuries/suspensions. Surely the aim is to be better than last season?

Fair comment - although Buckley being seen as a deeper midfielder and not a false 9/attacker arguably strengthens it, depending on how you rate Rothwell. 

11 minutes ago, SuperBrfc said:

As soon as I see somebody hesitate to bring in quality because they 'don't want to block the pathways', that's when I know we are on to a loser. That is what Broughton displayed a few days ago, in my view.

An extreme example, as he was a top class manager, but remember when Wenger refused to properly replace Vieira, Henry and Co because he "didn't want to block the pathway of the youngsters"? They persisted with those youngsters and went to shit (relative to their ambitions) and have been floundering for 18 years without a league title.

In our case, we've been floundering for 12 years and look set to add a few more to that as Broughton feeds us some guff about a youth project and "measures of success".

I'm not convinced that any of this lot (aside from JDT, maybe) are serious about promotion. It looks like it is all about developing kids, getting them minutes and hoping to sell them on for big fees further down the line.

You only have to read/listen to Broughton's spiel to understand what he sees as success.

One of the first things he said when he arrived was that Rovers would have to overachieve to make it to the Premier League. Inspirational stuff and exactly what you want to hear.

Next, he talked about how almost 40 percent of the minutes played by the Rovers squad last season were from Academy players, and how that needed to be maintained this season. Why? Is the aim to win football matches and try and go up or to give minutes to youngsters and crow about how many first teamers are from the Academy?

On a podcast about his time at Bodo, he talks about how one of the ways of measuring success was by looking at the 'R number' of the Football Club. That is done at any stage, over a five year average, by looking at how many young players from the Academy are in the first team. The more, the better, for the 'R number'. What a load of bollocks! I thought football was about trying to be the best, though? I've obviously had it wrong for all of these years.

Just like the 40 percent quote about the Rovers first team, he proudly mentioned how Bodo had 35 percent of their first team made up of North Norwegians from their Academy. This guy will do stuff all, IMO, and won't help us to get promoted. As long as the youngsters are getting game time, it's all good.

Bear in mind, he turned up at Luton when they had just finished outside the play offs in the Championship. They went on to suffer three successive relegations whilst he was there. Not saying it was all on him, clearly. However, in his own words, he had the autonomy to implement the vision of the Academy. Three relegations. Yet he takes the fact that youngsters got first team football and brought increased financial value to the club as plusses. Three relegations, but the above are positives. That should serve as a warning sign, in my opinion.

We missed out on Anel, Davies, many of us are after Van Hecke and another quality defender. Will he want to 'block the pathway' for Carter and Phillips by bringing in a couple of quality defenders? I highly doubt it. I'm expecting another cheap loan back there.

Our DoF would do well to remember what Alan Hansen said, and it still applies today 27 years on:

"You can't win anything with kids".

Respect your opinion, but I think it's too black and white. 

Bringing through youth players isn't an inherently good or bad thing - it depends on how good the kids are! I don't think anybody would advocate playing Garrett, Wharton or Carter unless there was a reasonable expectation that they will soon be worth their place in the side.  

Obviously it doesn't always work, but we've had our fingers burned by not giving young players enough chances. Josh King and Jack O'Connell to take two examples both turned into good premier league players pretty soon after they left Rovers, and we let them slip through our fingers by not playing them enough. As well as costing us very good players who could get us out of the league, those decisions also cost us potentially tens of millions of pounds that could've been crucial in funding a serious promotion bid. 

Given the financial advantage that relegated clubs will always have over us, we can't afford to be wasting assets that we already have on our books in my view. 

1 hour ago, Mellor Rover said:

My team for the Swans:

Kaminski

Brittain Ayala Wharton Pickering

Travis Buckley

Dolan Szmodics Brereton

Gallagher

Subs: Pears, Phillips, Edun, Morton, Dack, Hedges, Vale

That probably makes the most sense to me, but I'm sorry to see Markanday drop out altogether. If I were JDT I'd be saying to him that he'll be starting (hopefully with Dack) against Hartlepool and that's his chance to show what he can do. 

10 minutes ago, bluebruce said:

The continually repeated notion that whether we sell or don't sell BBD for £15 million won't affect our budget at all is a delusion.

Would be interesting to know how our budget for this season was arrived at - but I'd guess that had we not sold Armstrong & we let him go for nowt this summer, then I suspect the budget would be smaller.

We might be saying something similar next year with Ben, depending on what happens this summer. 

1 hour ago, JoeH said:

Vale's movement, first touch & ability to link up with those around him is far superior for me.

What do you make of his sharpness & general physicality?

My sense of his game vs QPR was that he showed one or two nice touches, but often struggled to get a kick. Certainly don't want to judge him too harshly given it was his first league start, and the service into him might've been a problem too, but it definitely felt like he was lacking the quickness or power to impose himself on the game. 

37 minutes ago, DavidMailsTightPerm said:

I think we dropped lucky with Diaz - for the first two years he didn't look like he was worth £20 let alone £20m. There was no apparent improvement in his game - if anything he seemed to go backwards as he lost confidence. Then the pandemic hit - games behind closed doors and his confidence rose. Then the call up for Chile - and his confidence went up another notch.

He showed enough in the match at the weekend to think that last season wasn't a flash in the pan.

Personally I don't think he left us in a weaker position (possibly just above when he joined originally) - we now have a younger squad than when he joined - but he did leave at a time when we had massive holes in our squad due to players leaving at the end of their contracts. The contract position is possibly not his fault, but similarly I don't think a young squad is entirely down to his master plan - you only have to look at his handling of Travis.  

Maybe not a masterplan, but not a total accident either. 

I might be fighting a losing battle on how his handling of young players is remembered, but I really don't think Mowbray did anything especially unreasonable there, especially with Travis. He gave him a bit of game time in the L1 season where he looked decent but not outstanding, and where he also got sent off for a horror challenge in an important game towards the run in. We then understandably began the season with the pair who got us promoted with 90 odd points, initially getting us good results before a dodgy spell leading up to Christmas (the first of many!). Travis then got his chance alongside Smallwood at Brammall lane & has been a key player since.

35 minutes ago, Bennisfromheaven said:

It occurred to me recently that we have always had decent goalscorers at the club during the venkys era!

Rhodes, Graham, Dack, Armstrong, BBD (more recently) have all challenged at the top of the goalscoring tables without rovers making much of an impact on the league.

Our problem has been getting the rest of the team to contribute.

Now, I believe a goalscorer will be the talisman that boosts the whole team but maybe its time to sell the prized goalscorer to strengthen other areas!?!

If we sold BBD & brought in van hecke, bowler, got a decent LB & took a chance on a cut price number 9, how would that sit with people?

Yakubu also in the Venkys era! And Gestede at the same time as Rhodes. Almost an uninterrupted decade of prolific strikers and 1.5 seasons towards the top of any league to show for it!

There will be some on here who will say we might as well keep him because we won't get the money to invest. That might be true - but if we were considering this from a normal perspective then selling is an complete no brainer (assuming he won't sign a new deal). We've assembled some very good players amongst the dross over this last ten years. Our trouble is that we've managed our assets abysmally and we're almost certain to carry on treading water unless that changes. 

The challenge is finding someone to replace BB even if we have a few quid to spend, and not just his goals because unlike poachers like Rhodes, Brereton has developed an impressive all round game. 

5 hours ago, Butty said:

12 goals last season in a poor team, the guy scores goals, if he went to a Cardiff or a Huddersfield I think he’d maybe do even better. I’m surprised a club hasn’t gone in for him, even at 28 years old. Very good player. 

Must admit that surprised me. It took him ages to get going as I recall. I knew that he scored a few when they replaced their manager but I still had him down as comfortably in single figures. 

3 minutes ago, CambridgeRover said:

Im sorry but Dack hasnt been the same since the injuries. Stunk the place up on his latest return. It isn't about the player he was but the player he is.

Did he? Do we actually have any evidence at all for this? 

I'll grant you that he didn't look the sharpest on his return last year (it would be a miracle if he did) but he still scored and showed some moments of real quality when most of our attacking players couldn't hit a barn door. 

Just now, Wheelton Blue said:

Regarding Dack. Time will tell whether he has the athleticism and can regain his form and fitness to fit into JDT's preferred style of play.

Every sucessful squad and manager are adaptable though; they have many ways of playing and ways to win games.

Dack will undoubtably get his chance at some point. On his day, he's a class act and our best player. He's a proven match winner.

To write him off at this stage, because he supposedly doesn't fill JDT's style, is premature IMO.

Definitely premature.

There are obvious question marks, but while there is still uncertainty about i) How extreme JDT will lean into basing our game on high pressing for 90 minutes, and ii) Dack's fitness and mobility once he gets more games under his belt, then it's impossible to know how well he can cope with playing in our new system. 

4 minutes ago, joey_big_nose said:

I agree with this he wasn't the quickest but he was always full of energy and worked hard. Also for a guy who was theoretically an AM his back to goal hold up and link up game is as good as any decent striker. Very strong.

But two ACLs means he isn't going to be running around. Just the way it is. Not his fault, not our fault.

Sammie coming in does indicate Dack is going to be a cameo player.

Doubt he's going anywhere though as not one will pay him the same wage as we are atm.

The highlighted bit is the thing that remains to be seen for me. If Sammie doesn't cut the mustard and we have a player of Dack's quality on the bench, it'll take a strong manger to stick to his guns (which, to be fair, he still might do). Equally, if Dack does 90 mins in the league cup, puts a shift in and shows what he can do, then that might be the start of JDT becoming more confident that Dack has something to offer in this system.

100% agree with the rest of your post, and Dack will obviously have to prove that he is still physically capable of playing at this level, which also remains to be seen. 

As an aside, whilst it was clear to see from Saturday that pressing as a team is something that JDT wants us to do, I don't think it looked streets away from how we've pressed (at times) under Mowbray. Maybe it'll get more intense as time goes on, but we've definitely seen teams that commit to pressing more than we appeared to. A pre-injury Dack could've played in that team without any issue whatsoever, although I accept that might not be the case for post-injury Dack!

16 minutes ago, 47er said:

Is it a witch hunt? Nobody on here picks the team and we all would be delighted if/when he returned to his best form surely?

Its been 2 long years without much from him so people are naturally doubtful.

Must be very frustrating for him and I suppose that's going to show from time to time. 

 

Yeah, I think this is fair enough. I do think some of the comments are in danger of forgetting the sort of player he was prior to his injury. He was never lazy in a million years for instance, quite the opposite actually. You couldn't miss his enthusiasm for the game and he'd often end up trying to chase down defenders when he didn't have much hope of catching them. He was never the most athletic I suppose, but it wasn't as much of a weakness as all that. 

Hopefully it's just a case of him having to be a bit more patient than he would ideally like. He'll certainly get chances to show what he can do with our squad being as it is.

2 minutes ago, roversfan99 said:

I think 3 central midfielders for 2 positions over 46 games is leaving us very short.

It certainly means that we'll be asking Garrett and Wharton to play non-trivial amounts of football. 

If we rate them enough then you can't get in their way too much, but I'd be more comfortable with one more senior player there. 

As much as we always beat QPR at home, we always lose away at Swansea. Even last year when we had about three gilt-edged chances, we somehow managed to lose. Can see that continuing at the weekend, sadly. Think they'll have a much better season this time than they did last year. 

I'd stick with the same team, I think. The only possible change I'd make is bringing in Dolan for either Vale or Gallagher for his pressing. 

3 minutes ago, RoverRB said:

No that’s complete waffle. Brittain gets up the line and bowler likes to cut in.

Fair enough. I know that Bowler scored  few last year, but I wasn't really sure what sort of player he was bar being an attacking midfield type

Saw that one of Nixon's denials was predicated on Brittain and Bowler not being suited to being in the same team.

I know that doesn't prove anything, but is there perhaps a point there? Is Bowler a proper chalk-on-his-boots winger? And if so is it likely we'll be playing that sort of player alongside a wing back like Brittain?

8 minutes ago, Tom said:

The fact that Butterworth is absent from the squad numbers shows he is off any day now 

Unlucky with injuries, and there is talent there, but if he's behind Vale (admittedly two very different players) at his age then his time is up.

Hope he makes of a success of things and we have the sense to put in a sell on % for one of our players for a change. 

6 minutes ago, Theaxe15 said:

Can’t see a correlation there I’m afraid, if it was a one in one out policy half of this message board wouldn’t be having panic attacks at our lack of business

You're probably right, but then again we're now left with only three senior centre backs, one of them is Carter and another can't be trusted to stay fit.

I know we have Phillips too, but it does leave us particularly short. I wonder if it's because we're close to bringing one in.